Enhancing citizenship education through sport among youngsters against violent extremism Erasmus Project

Project Title

Enhancing citizenship education through sport among youngsters against violent extremism

Project Key Action

This project related with these key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Project Action Type

This project related with this action type : Strategic Partnerships for youth

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2018

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Intercultural/intergenerational education and (lifelong)learning; EU Citizenship, EU awareness and Democracy; Youth (Participation, Youth Work, Youth Policy)

Project Summary

Radicalization processes leading to violent extremism have been on the rise throughout Europe for several years and particularly affect young people between the ages of 13 and 30. Violent radicalization first and foremost compromises the future and well-being of the young person concerned.
The Sports Identity project is based on a paradox: while sport and associated values are activities fostering to the development of active citizenship, it nevertheless appears that some sport clubs can be a field of potential embarkation leading to violent radicalization. The risks are more or less significant according to the geographical location, the sociological characteristics of the public, the level of supervision and professionalisation of the educators.
The EU stresses the importance of youth work in promoting fundamental values and the primary prevention of violent radicalization. Sport and sports organizations can contribute to this goal. Member States now target prevention strategies adapted to the sport field
SPORTS IDENTITY is a 24-month project coordinated by CREPS IDF and bringing together 5 representative partners from 4 European countries, all with proven expertise on the links between Sport and the prevention of violent radicalization. The aim of the “Sports Identity” project is to reinforce the role of sport and its positive values as an environment fostering education for citizenship and resilience to extremist ideologies.
The project should result in tools that help Sport and Youth educators develop skills for youth to develop active citizenship: teamwork, leadership, cross-cultural skills, problem solving, and critical thinking. . These tools should help organizations become involved with young athletes to overcome the difficult identity issues that can arise in adolescence and beyond. The stakes are above all, especially among young people facing the risk of marginalization and social exclusion, to give them the means to face the difficulties of growing up in a modern, complex and pluralistic society.
Sports identity must help reaffirm the contribution of Sport as a fundamental tool for youth work and non-formal education. It should bring the Education and Youth animation sector closer together: Sport has a role to play in enabling young people to be active citizens and to preserve extremist ideologies that can lead to violence.
On the basis of a Benchmark of the good practices of development of the active citizenship by and in the Sport, It must allow the development and the experimentation in several European territories of 2 innovating tools:
• Methodological guide to support the construction of a “sports citizenship” in sport and through Sport. This tool must provide a simple and practical methodological framework allowing sports clubs and youth organizations to build internally and in addition to their internal rules a “charter of sports and civic values”.
• Toolkit and online training for youth leaders and sports educators to prevent radicalization leading to violent extremism in sport. The final production will take the form of an Open Educational Resource (OER) including online learning resources (e-learning modules, downloadable content, assessment tools)
SPORTIS IDENTITY innovates in several ways in the field of generic prevention of the risks of violent radicalization among young people:
– It tackles an environment still little studied with regard to violent radicalization: sport and physical activities
– It aims to promote Sport and its associated values as an environment conducive to the generic prevention of violent radicalization. Sport is heard in a broad way, covering the sports movement and more broadly sport for all, socio-educational animation using sport. The challenge of the project is to demonstrate concordances and transfers between sporting values and the fundamental values of citizenship.
SPORTS IDENTITY wants to demonstrate that supervised sport can be an environment conducive to the articulation between identity questioning in a process of personal development, the framework and the universal sporting values, and in this way an environment which repels the attempts of hooks made by violent extremist ideologies

Project Website

https://erasmus.creps-idf.fr/

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 206395,25 Eur

Project Coordinator

CENTRE DE RESSOURCES D’EXPERTISE ET DE PERFORMANCE SPORTIVES D’ILE DE FRANCE & Country: FR

Project Partners

• CENTRO SPORTIVO ITALIANO
• C A I – CONVERSAS ASSOCIACAO INTERNACIONAL
• CENTRO INTERNAZIONALE PER LA PROMOZIONE DELL’EDUCAZIONE E LO SVILUPPO ASSOCIAZIONE
• ALLGEMEINER SPORTVERBAND SALZBURG (ASVO SALZBURG)